WASHINGTON – A powerful House committee chairman threatened on Friday to force a floor vote to break the impasse within Democratic ranks over President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul, a drastic step that could roil the House.

Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., said negotiations with fiscally conservative Democrats on his panel cannot continue indefinitely. But a floor vote would put fellow Democrats in an exposed position, having to cast a vote on a $544-billion upper-income tax increase that the Senate is unlikely to embrace to help pay for covering the millions of uninsured Americans.

The problems on the House side of the Capitol come a day after Senate Democratic leaders announced they would not go ahead as planned with a floor vote before Congress departs for its August recess. Senate Democrats are also divided. While some are negotiating with Republicans, others want to plow ahead on their own.

“We’re going to have to look at perhaps bypassing the (Energy and Commerce) committee because we’ve got to get moving on this legislation,” Waxman said. “I hope we don’t come to that conclusion.”

Two House panels have already passed legislation. Waxman is stymied because seven conservatives on his committee – part of a group called the Blue Dog Democrats – are sticking together.

Negotiations are continuing, but Waxman said he’s running out of patience.

“We’re not going to let them empower the Republicans to control the committee,” he said.

“This can’t be an interminable discussion,” Waxman added.

As lawmakers continued to haggle, the White House said President Barack Obama will keep working on health care in August even if Congress goes home.

“Nobody in planning meetings decided we should just take August off,” said White House press secretary Robert Gibbs. “For a long time we planned to continue the discussion on the issues that are important, be it the economy, health care … education. That had always in many ways been priced into the scenario.”

Obama met Friday morning at the White House with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont. Reid said Thursday that the panel will push to complete a bill before the Senate breaks Aug. 7. Baucus has been negotiating with the panel’s Republicans in hopes of producing a bipartisan bill.